Cinder's feathers shifted through troubled grays and somber blues as she processed my words. Her ocean-blue eyes were wide with a mix of horror and dawning understanding.

"I... I didn't know," she whispered. "About Sarah. Em told me she was just being stupid, that she wandered out at night because she wanted to prove herself...

“Where were you when it happened?” I asked everyone.

"I was in the Gilded Gryphon Inn room," Cinder said quietly. "With Io. Em was sharing a room with Vee and Sol."

"I was high as balls," Io admitted. "Em was chewing me up about something, so I did a bunch of stuff. Didn't even know what happened until way later."

"I didn't do shit with my assigned team," Katherine said grimly. "Told them to screw off and do whatever. Stayed in a private room in the Guild Cathedral. Broke my assigned team Captain's wrist when he tried to force me into staying with them at the Gilded Gryphon."

I looked at Vespera.

"I was getting smashed with Sol," she said, beak facing down and looking at me with a guilty face. "Em bought us two-hundred year old Shadow-wine and we played drinking card games till we got completely wasted by nightfall. Em said about teaching the nullie a lesson and Sol and I just laughed I think... I can't remember what I even said. Fuuuuck."

"Yeah," I nodded. "And that's why I drained Em's delver card. That's why I'm going to make her life on Shandria extremely unpleasant."

"Two wrongs don't make a right," Io mused.

"No," I agreed. "But three hundred platinum pieces worth of wrong might buy us enough influence to make sure it never happens again. All of you were here in Shandria and you did nothing, closed your eyes or didn't know. Sarah wasn't the first victim but I will sure as hell make sure that she is the last."

A heavy silence fell over our group as the thoroughly shamed Omnids and I walked through the bustling streets of Shandria.

. . .

"So... Guild time?" Io asked, trying to fill in the silence between us.

"Not yet," I shook my head, latching onto a colorful merchant who manned a table filled with various fruits.

"Excuse me!" I called out to the man, who appeared to be some kind of bird-headed, dark feathered being. "What are those and how much?"

"Thems springapples from my farm," the man replied. "Three copper for twenty."

"Perfect!" I handed over three copper coins and received a bag of springapples. "So tell me about your farm..."

"Oh for Slayer's sake," Katherine groaned as I engaged the merchant in an enthusiastic discussion about agriculture on Arx. “More delays.”

The bird-headed man, who introduced himself as Agromancer Krekof, was more than happy to talk about his crowkin family's springapple orchard just outside the city walls, tended by a large tentacled walker-type beast known as the Agrilopod. After milking him dry about this and that, I moved onto another merchant and then another.

For the next few hours, I systematically interrogated every merchant, street vendor, and random passerby within reach about their wares, lives, and local customs. Katherine's patience visibly deteriorated with each interaction, while Vespera found the whole thing mildly amusing. Cinder alternated between exasperated sighs and curious listening, occasionally adding her own questions or just browsing downloaded games on her phone looking bored.

Io just kept munching his interdimensional chips, occasionally offering commentary about how certain market items reminded him of things he'd seen through his gates.

"What are these colorful towers?" I asked a ginger foxgirl salesperson who was selling Voicecast bracelets from an outside booth next to a Guildnet shop, pointing a finger at a distinctively violet massive citadel-tower looming above us.

"That's a Mage Tower, friend," the foxgirl replied, wiggling large orange ears my way. "They're build by Archmages and their Enclaves from stones cleansed through magic."

"Cleansed how?" I asked.

"I dunno," she shrugged. "I'm not a mage. It's some kind of a bigly ritual involving entire Witch Covens or Mage Enclaves that does each one. See how they have individual colors? The color generally correlates to what the Enclave specializes in. Seer magic is Violet for example, so that's a Seer Tower. Their Enclave can predict magical events or find lost things."

"I see," I said. "Is it possible to buy one?"

"Nah," she said. "A Tower like that is passed from mage to mage within the Enclave. They don't sell em. A bunch of particular Enclaves usually form Guilds, which lease land from local Highborn Lords. For example, the Estate of Lord Rubius owns the shop behind me and pays my salary."

"Can I buy a building and open a Barbershop?" I asked.

The foxgirl eyed me with silver-blue eyes. "If you got the cash. You're a human, ye?"

I nodded.

"You can sublease land from one of the Highborn Estates," she said. "High Lords generally don't sell buildings or land, it stays in their family, passed from pure human to pure human."

Huh.

"Humans can do magic on Arx?" I asked her.

"Is this some kind of a trick question?" She stared at me like I was a concussed idiot. "Everyone can do magic on Arx. Everyone on Arx has heart cores."

Except for me, it seems.

"What if someone was born without a heart core?" I asked.

"Ain't never heard of such a thing," she replied.

"Do plants have heart cores?"

"Plants have itty-bitty, micro-shards in every leaf or something," she shrugged. "I dunno. I'm a Voicecast spec, not an Agromancer."

"Can I Voicecast other dimensions?"

"No."

"Can I Voicecast anyone anywhere on Arx?"

"No. You can easily Voicecast anyone with a Voicecast bracelet within Shandria. The Guildnet operating Mage Towers can connect you to Guildnet towers of other Shadow Empire cities or beyond it, but it won't be cheap."

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"Can I Voicecast a dungeon?"

"No. Dungeons aren't sentient."

"Can I Voicecast the dead?"

"Yes."

What the fuck.

"Really?"

"Yeah. It's not cheap though and the dead are generally obsessed over some stupidly specific shit they wanted to do while they were alive. I wouldn't recommend it."

"Is talking to the dead Necromancy?"

"No," the foxgirl shook her head. "It's just something that all high-level Nuntix Kitlix can do." She pointed at the magenta-colored Kitlix on her shoulder. "Necromancy aka raising the dead is illegal in Shandria. Anyone collaborating with a Necromage is to be executed by fire."

"I see," I nodded.

I moved on from the Voicecast salesgirl to other booths down the row of shops.

I learned about local politics, market prices, Guild regulations, and most importantly - which areas to avoid. The merchants were particularly eager to warn us about the "bad" districts and share gossip about Highborns, monster attacks, dungeons, the Shadow Leviathan that ate people at night and Kitlix that were born from old magical items.

As we made our way through the winding streets of Shandria, I continued my relentless information gathering campaign, until my throat felt raw. Every few steps brought a new target - street sweepers, window cleaners, craftsmen, food cart operators, even children playing with strange magic toys and pawing at adorable owl-kittens and sleek fox-crow pets called Chuppies.

Katherine's eye twitching became more pronounced with each delay and every random question I asked every single person in my path.

I learned the prices of everything from street food to construction materials, with Yulia transcribing our conversations. Due to lack of internet the AI wasn't connected to the various Omncorp LLM APIs so she wasn't as clever or as fast at sorting information, but she was still cataloguing everything for review later.

The local currency seemed to follow a completely different value system than Earth or Omnithornia, heavily favoring certain magical properties over raw materials. This was because Arx was insanely wealthy when it came to raw materials, plus some mages could convert materials into pure gold or diamonds with ease and duplicate non-magical and some slightly magical items. The more magical something was, the harder it was to duplicate, according to a key-duplication expert at a keymaker's booth.

As my companions grew progressively weary and irate, I pulled them into a cafe and we all enjoyed a hearty lunch. I swallowed my meal quickly and then chatted at the crowgirl waitress while everyone ate their food like normal people.

In another hour, I pulled everyone into an imposing building covered in red and black flags.

"Why are we here?" Cinder asked. "This isn't the Adventurers Guild."

"It's better," I grinned. "This is the Guild of Manhunters."

"The what? WHAT?" Most of my companions made noises like a confused flock. Only Vespera was giving me an evaluating look.

I ignored them, walking to the teller booths.

The teller who greeted us was composed of gray stone and pale blue sapphire, his crystalline features catching the light as he moved. He was basically a fusion of a rock and a person.

"Welcome to the Guild of Manhunters," he said, stone beard twinkling. "I'm Zelsh Gofrotash. How may we assist you today?"

"I'd like to place a bounty," I said cheerfully.

"A bounty?" The man arched an eyebrow. "Do you have the cash? Minimum bounty is ten thousand gold."

I jiggled my coin bag.

"Very well, follow me to my office to discuss the details," the man said. "Do be aware that we mainly hunt down criminals or runaway property."

"Oh she's a big criminal alright," I nodded.

"So. Who is the target?" Zelsh asked as he sat down behind a marble desk, offering our group leather seats.

"This individual," I showed the man a picture of Emerald on my phone. "Emerald Stratos. She'll be arriving in Shandria within the next 28 hours or less via a gate. She will emerge from the Arx bank on 303 Mantaray Street."

"Alex!" Cinder hissed, grabbing my arm. "You... The Manhunters are serious business! Are you seriously going to have Em assassinated?!"

"Oh, I'm not asking them to kill her," I clarified, turning back to the crystalline teller. "Just... inconvenience her a bit. Make her stay in Shandria somewhat unpleasant. Nothing permanent. Put a bag over her head for a week, keep her in a basement... until I heroically rescue her of course. I wouldn't want her to die here."

"This can be arranged," the rock-man nodded. "A week of opponent imprisonment is thirty thousand gold. What level mage is she? What's her alignment?"

"She's a Rubicund Lindworm," I explained. "High-level predator with fire abilities, enhanced strength, and expensive protective gear. Her alignment is Chaotic Evil with a side of entitled brat."

"No," Zelsh shook his stoney head. "I don't know what a Rubicund Lindworm is. What's her magical alignment?"

"She's basically a dragon, I guess," I shrugged. "Throws dragonfire around. Weak to water jets."

"Hrm," the crystal man stroked his glittering beard. "Given the target's capabilities, that would raise the price to fifty thousand gold. We'd need to employ specialized containment methods."

"Fifty thousand?" I whistled. "That's a bit steep. What about just following her around and making her life difficult? What can I get for twenty thousand gold? Can you annoy her for a week and then make sure she ends up in a situation where she'll need rescue due to falling into a well or something?"

"For twenty thousand, we can arrange for continuous harassment and minor inconveniences," the crystal man replied. "Falling into a well can be arranged too. Our agents will ensure her stay in Shandria is thoroughly unpleasant without causing permanent harm."

"Perfect!" I pulled out Em's money. "Here's twenty thousand gold. Make sure she has the worst week of her life. She will try to attack my group, your job will be to distract her with random NPC events."

"I'm not familiar with the term NPC," Zelsh said. "But I understand that you wish her 'distracted'."

Cinder twitched beside me, but didn't argue.

The crystal man counted the coins quickly and nodded. "Contract accepted. Our agents will begin surveillance as soon as the target arrives through the gate. Do you have any specific requests for the type of harassment?"

"Nothing violent," I said thoughtfully. "Maybe... dump smelly water on her occasionally from windows or have children throw apples at her. Be creative. Don't be obvious about it."

"Absolutely," the crystal teller nodded. "Harassment without physical damage. Thank you for your patronage."

"I can't believe you just did that," Katherine muttered from behind us as we walked out of the Guild. "Actually, wait. Yes I can."

"Impressive," Vespera clicked her beak. "Fifty shades of petty revenge. Didn't know that the Manhunters guild could be asked to annoy someone like that."

"Talk to enough random people and you too will be wise," I grinned.

Cinder simply sighed, given up on trying to make me deviate from my anti-Emerald plans.

"Don’t look so glum, Ci. It's basic corporate psychological warfare," Vespera shrugged. "Ain't nothing new under the sun. I don't have a beef with Em, since I mooched off her gold for years, but Lex obviously has a plan that requires this. Who am I to question my wise human husbando?"

"I am crushed with your compliments," I pretended to faint. "Husbando? At least take me to dinner first!"

"But darling," Vespera draped herself dramatically across my shoulders, her magisteel armor clinking. "I thought what we had was special! All those meaningful glances across the classroom, the way you let me zap your..."

"Vee! You've known him for like four days!" Cinder growled.

"Ah, but tis love at first spark," Vespera sighed dreamily. "When he walked past art class looking like a perfect snack, I just knew..."

"Will you two STOP?!" Cinder hissed, wings shifting through angry reds and jealous greens.

"Never!" Vespera cackled. "Your reactions are too precious! Look at those colors! You're like a walking rainbow of denial! This is so much more fun than you being drab and dark around Em. Gosh. I'm tingling all over."

"You're insufferable," Cinder growled at us both.

"And you love us for it," I grinned. "Now come on, we've got an Adventurers Guild to visit before all the good quests are taken."

"Finally!" Katherine exclaimed. "Something actually productive!"

"Follow," I grinned at her, wrapping my arms around Cinder and Vespera.

I led our group through winding alleys, following directions gathered from various merchants.

"Umm. The Adventurers Guild is that way," Katherine pointed at a massive cathedral-like structure visible above the rooftops.

"We're taking a shortcut," I said, turning down a narrow side street.

"This doesn't look like a shortcut," Cinder commented as we descended a set of worn stone steps into what appeared to be a lower district.

"Trust me," I grinned, "It's a shortcut to adventure!"